30 October, 2007

MILIVOJE IVANISEVIC'S DISTURBED MIND OF GENOCIDE DENIAL

Updated Version! Expanded on November 1st, 2007 with references to the International Criminal Tribunal's statements on Milivoje Ivanisevic's denials of Srebrenica genocide, as well as more information about Munira Subasic's sons whom Ivanisevic mentioned in his propaganda statements...

Photo Caption: One of many Srebrenica mass graves, most recentone being Zeleni Jadar, where the victims were shot to death andthey included children who were between 7 and 11 years old.

Editor's note:We are responding to recent allegations made by the Belgrade based Srebrenica genocide denier Milivoje Ivanisevic against the Srebrenica massacre survivor Munira Subasic.Ivanisevic claimed that Munira Subasic's son was "well" and "alive" in the United States living "under different name." Nothing could be further from the truth, as we personally contacted the Association of Srebrenica Women and spoke directly to their president, Hajra Catic.

A Bosnian Serb War Veterans’ organisation - comprised of Chetniks who participated in the Srebrenica genocide - has recently claimed it had a 'proof' that at least one thousand victims listed as being killed in Srebrenica were alive or died before the July 1995 massacre. The so called "proof" came from the radical Serbian nationalist (aka: Belgrade researcher) and disgraced Srebrenica genocide denier, Milivoje Ivanisevic. As a side note: Ivanisevic also runs a website that features such articles as "Was 'Srebrenica genocide' a hoax?" and other propaganda material - perfectly suitable to be filed under categories of Science Fiction and Conspiracy.

The list of missing in question appears to be very report published by the Bosnian Serb government - as an admittance of guilt - in connection with the Srebrenica massacre (the Republika Srpska Srebrenica Commission's June 2004 report). The president of the Srebrenica Commission Milan Bogdanic (Serb), said they "were not determining the number of the dead, but the number of missing" and "came up with the final list of all the missing after comparing the data from various data-bases which together contained over 150 thousand of different names." When Bogdanic asked Bosnian Serb War Veteran's organization for their "proof" to be submitted to him, they refused to give it to him.

Little does Milivoje Ivanisevic realize, but the updated/revised report has been published by the Federal Commission for Missing Persons which removed technical errors and duplicates from previous compilations. The list contains the victims' names, parents' names, dates of birth, and unique citizen's registration numbers of 8,106 individuals who have been reliably established, from multiple independent sources, to have gone missing and/or been killed in and around Srebrenica in the summer of 1995. Another detailed report has been evaluated by the Demographic Unit research team of the U.N. war crimes tribunal in The Hague and recently published by the Research and Documentation Center / RDC bringing the minimum number of victims to 8,460. The RDC was funded by the Norwegian government, the Swedish Helsinki Committee, the U.S. government, the U.S. Institute of Peace, the Dutch government, the United Nations Development Program, and the non-governmental Heinrich Boell Foundation.

Further more, as an example of - what he calls - 'manipulations' with Srebrenica, Milivoje Ivanisevic points fingers to Munira Subasic, president of Mothers of Srebrenica Association. He claims that Subasic reported her son as killed in Srebrenica, "while he was alive and well in the United States, only living under a different name."But this was just another distortionist claim produced by Ivanisevic himself.

We contacted the Associaton of Srebrenica Women (Tuzla) and spoke to Hajra Catic who told us that Munira Subasic is in Sarajevo and has been actively involved with the Mothers of Srebrenica Association in Sarajevo. We learned from Hajra Catic that Munira Subasic's older son Vahidin Subasic managed to reach government controlled territory in deadly moments of 1995 and has been living with her in Sarajevo ever since; and contrary to Milivoje Ivanisevic's claims, her son has never changed his name and has not been listed as killed. Hajra also told us that Munira Subasic's younger son Nermin and her husband Hilmo Subasic died in the massacre when Srebrenica fell to Serbs. Both of them are listed as missing.Sadly, Hajra Catic's son Nino Nihad Catic and her husband Junuz Catic are also missing since 12 July 1995. Our heart goes to both women - Munira and Hajra - and to all the victims and survivors of the massacre.

In his latest media circus, Milivoje Ivanisevic did not want to lose opportunity to repeat one of his favorite conspiracy theories, quote: "Already next year, at the Bosnian Muslim elections held in 1996, more than 700 Bosnian Muslims from Srebrenica whose names were on the list of those killed in July 1995 showed up to cast their votes."

To back up this claim, Milivoje Ivanisevic used incomplete and out of date list of missing which was compiled by the Red Cross immediately after the massacre, 1995. The list he refered to was revised numerous times, and other - highly accurate - lists of killed and missing were produced with the support of the United Nations and other non-partisan sources. It would be interesting to see how Ivanisevic came up with more than 700 alleged voters from the list and what methodology he used. Considering his background, extremist leanings, radical nationalist activism, and open denial of Srebrenica genocide - it is reasonable to conclude that he has zero credibility to be even considered a "researcher".He is more accurately categorized as conspiracy theorist, and we recognize him as such.

Milivoje Ivanisevic's claims are nothing new; he is one of the most frequently quoted 'sources' in Srebrenica genocide denial literature which is readily available over the internet. For quite some time, Ivanisevic's claims have been discredited on numerous occassions by the International Criminal Tribunal, the Research and Documentation Center, and Serbia's Human Rights Watch. As an alternative to Milivoje Ivanisevic's discredited make-belief allegations, you can also read our Questions and Answers about Srebrenica Genocide.

As recently as March 14 2007, the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia at the Hague released the following statement, quote:

I would like to start by commenting on the special supplement titled "Licna karta Srebrenice" in the Monday issue of the Belgrade-based Glas Javnosti newspaper, written by Milivoje Ivanisevic. The introductory part of the supplement states that Mister Ivanisevic's "investigative review" takes side with the view which denies genocide, and that it can serve as a contribution to the possible debate on the genocide committed in Srebrenica. Without going to details of the article, I would like to state that the piece in question represents shameful denial and relativisation of the facts that this court has established beyond reasonable doubt about the genocide committed in Srebrenica. International Court of Justice confirmed that genocide was committed in Srebrenica, but the facts about the genocide were established first in the judgements by the Tribunal's Trial and Appeals Chambers in the case against Radislav Krstc. The ICTY wishes to condemn this as well as other recent attempts to deny the genocide committed in Srebrenica, in which more than 7000 men and boys were executed. I strongly recommend that anyone wishing to debate about the events in Srebrenica starts by reading the judgements of this court, which established facts after careful weighing of evidence produced by years of investigations, thousands of exhibits, testimonies of both survivors and perpetrators, all fully tested and confirmed by a neutral international court. [source: ICTY]

In 2005, the International Criminal Tribunal concluded that Milivoje Ivanisevic's published lists and reports about Serb victims around Srebrenica "simply do not meet reality."In other words, Ivanisevic might have committed forgery. [source link]

Milivoje Ivanisevic has continued to ignore the mountain of evidence with respect to genocide in Srebrenica. He has purposely used misleading and out of date reports to cast doubt on the credibility of over 8,000 victims of the worst massacre in Europe since the World War II. Ivanisevic's ignorance of judicial rulings, DNA evidence, numerous mass grave excavations, hundreds of thousands of pages of eye-witness testimony, and mountain of evidence presented in front of the international courts is no different than Ed Herman's attempt to make disappear from history the roughly 8000 victims of Srebrenica massacre. Both Herman and Ivanisevic failed miserably when confronted with facts. Andras Riedlmayer has published great analysis of Edward Herman's fallacies in the following article titled: Edward Herman on The Lists of Missing at Srebrenica.

SPECIAL THANK YOU:

PLEASE DONATE:

Srebrenica Genocide is not a matter of anybody's opinion; it's a judicial fact recognized first by the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia and subsequently by the International Court of Justice.